Over twenty years ago, I had an intermittent conversation about homosexuality with a gay man at work. Although he persistently brought up the subject, he would periodically fly into a rage and call me a bigot when I disagreed with him. That man went on to become a key homosexual organizer in my city.

Five years ago, I wrote a letter to the editor of my newspaper concerning how the paper was becoming an organ of gay advocacy. I forwarded the letter to a group who received regular mailings from me. One man responded and disclosed himself as a gay. He accused me of wanting to submit gays to the equivalent of the Spanish Inquisition. He used several abusive terms which reminded me of other encounters I have had with gays, including the individual mentioned in the first paragraph. I replied that I refused to be bullied and intimidated into silence.

Are gays inherently hysterical, hateful, and intolerant of disagreement, I wondered, or are they reading off the same script? Are they systematically organized to strike out at opponents, and to silence them through intimidation? The answer is that no, homosexuals are not necessarily hysterical, hateful, or intolerant by nature — but yes, this is something they have learned. It is a technique called "jamming," which is part of an elaborate program to further the gay agenda.

Propaganda and thought control

I learned about jamming by reading the articles How America Went Gay, and Thought Reform and the Psychology of Homosexual Advocacy by Charles W. Socarides, M.D., President of the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH) and a clinical professor of psychiatry at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. He is the author of the book Homosexuality: A Freedom Too Far (1995). Socarides drew a lot of his information about the program that involves "jamming" from the book After the Ball: How America Will Conquer Its Fear and Hatred of Gays in the 1990's (1990) by Marshall Kirk and Hunter Madsen. This book is a blueprint for gay activists for applying brainwashing techniques developed by the totalitarian regime of Communist China. These techniques were catalogued in Robert Jay Lifton's seminal work, Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of Brainwashing in China (1989).

The program borrowed from the Chinese and put forward for gay activism by Kirk and Madsen involves three steps: 1) desensitization, 2) jamming, and 3) conversion.

1) Desensitization — Through constant exposure to homosexuals on television, in the movies, on radio, and in the newspapers, the public would become accustomed to gays being a normal part of their life. The image conveyed would be that gays are ordinary people like everyone else. As the gays came out of the closet to show a public face, the startling aspects of gay perversion and pathology would be left in the closet — concealed from the public eye. The goal of desensitization is public indifference.

2) Jamming — The object of jamming is to shame gay opponents into silence. The shame comes from the accusation of bigotry and from social stigmatization.

"All normal people feel shame when they perceive that they are not thinking, feeling, or acting like the pack...The trick is to get the bigot into the position of feeling a conflicted twinge of shame....when his homohatred surfaces.

"Thus, propagandistic advertisement can depict homophobic and homohating bigots as crude loudmouths.... It can show them being criticized, hated, shunned. It can depict gays experiencing horrific suffering as the direct result of homohatred-suffering of which even most bigots would be ashamed to be the cause." (Kirk and Madsen)

Notice the two elements — the shaming of the alleged "bigot" by making him feel like a social pariah and the depiction of the suffering gay to win sympathy. In my personal experience, I have met with two versions of the shaming tactics from gays. The first is the personal attack (ad hominem, meaning "against the man"). The ad hominem attack ignores the logic and facts put forward by the opponent and accuses him of being a bigot — i.e., a shameful being. The insult is pure assertion and unsupported by facts. It is essentially a threat to socially stigmatize the person if he does not desist from his opposition to the gay agenda.

This tactic is very effective in a politically correct group-think environment — such as college campuses and newsrooms. Politicians as a class are extremely sensitive to the threat of being publicly stigmatized. Remember Kirk and Marsden's idea that "people feel shame when they perceive that they are not thinking, feeling, or acting like the pack." These may be primitive wolf-pack group-think tactics, but they are powerful nonetheless.

Almost all of us have been through this kind of thing. A perfect example is the high school clique. Retribution for violating the code of the clique involves public shaming and demonization. One becomes an "untouchable" — a pariah to every clique and caste in the school.

A study of the life cycle of a business found that the terminal stage of decline was when group-think prevailed. At this point, the in-group became an end in itself and the customer became an inconvenient nuisance. James F. Welles, Ph.D., wrote The Story of Stupidity, which examined historical eras in which many people were seized by a self-destructive collective stupidity. In each case, group-think prevailed, and rationality and independent thought were driven out. "Political correctness" is a form of contemporary group-think that drives out common sense. This poisoned environment has created the opportunity for the abusive nonsense of gay "jamming" to flourish. However toxic and destructive wolf-pack group-think is, it is a powerful temptation that man, a social animal, is prone to, and which dictators make use of.

When I testified before the Ohio Senate Committee on the Defense of Marriage (DOM) Act, the Republican committee chairman, who favors the act, allowed those against DOM to repeatedly make charges of bigotry and hatred against those who favored DOM. He allowed them to run on with no time limit as they painted the gay lifestyle in glowing terms and wallowed in their personal pain from bigotry. Unfortunately, he did not allow those in favor of DOM to answer the charges of bigotry or refute any of the assertions the anti-DOM folks made. He refused to allow experts to speak about the tragic realities of the homosexual lifestyle. Why? He probably did not want to be called a "bigot" in front of the TV cameras. He was scared to death of public jamming and shaming. Even though he voted for DOMA, he was terrified at being publicly branded as not being "one of the pack." This accords perfectly with Chinese brainwashing techniques. Consider Kirk and Marsden again:

"...our effect is achieved without reference to facts, logic, or proof. Just as the bigot became such, without any say in the matter, through repeated infralogical emotional conditioning, his bigotry can be alloyed in exactly the same way, whether he is conscious of the attack or not. In short, jamming succeeds insofar as it inserts even a slight frisson of doubt and shame into the previously unalloyed, self-righteous pleasure. This approach can be quite useful and effective — if our message can get the massive exposure upon which all else depends."

The gays have indeed been given massive public exposure by liberals on TV, in the movies, and within the print media. This aggressive use of the media has been a priority of the agenda of gay leaders at least since 1971.

The "frisson of doubt" inserted through emotional conditioning is especially effective on men in the clergy. They view themselves as men of conscience and compassion — and like to be seen by others as such. Thus, when the pastor speaks in accord with the scriptures and calls gay sexual practices a sin, he may feel an almost unconscious shiver of doubt and shame. It is not the shame of violating a universal moral law or upholding the truth of the Bible. It is the shame of violating a social taboo and the fear of being seen by men that he is lacking in compassion and sensitivity. It plays to the ultimate fear of many pastors, the fear of public disgrace.

Denominations like the Episcopalians, the Lutherans, the Presbyterians, and the Methodists are in a pitched battle over whether to ordain gays, or to bless gay unions. Many of the theological moderates and many of the Bishops have taken to saying that they are "open" to hearing both sides. By taking no public position, they hide from the threat of being defamed by one side as being a "bigot" and a "hater," or being charged by the other side with being unscriptural.

The resistance against the gay agenda in the churches is left to the most conservative, the most principled, and those most willing to stand alone. Those who love God and truth more than they hate being publicly slimed by the gay activists and their liberal allies must often bear a heavy cost. When the liberal clergy seize control of a denomination and back the gay agenda, they ostracize the conservatives who oppose the gay agenda and exclude them from the seminaries, from denominational committees, and from speaking engagements. So much for liberal "tolerance" and "inclusion."

One aspect of the shaming technique is to portray how much pain the gay suffers as a result of the intolerance of the bigot. The movie Philadelphia, starring Tom Hanks, is a media tour de force in getting wide audiences to sympathize with the sufferings of a gay man and to be disgusted with the persecutions of his bigoted tormentors. Everyone who places a high value on compassion is bound to be swayed by the movie. It is one of the greatest masterpieces of propaganda ever put on screen. The not-so-subtle message is — "Shame on you bigots for not giving your approval to the cute and sensitive Tom Hanks — who just happens to be gay." With one stroke, the bigots are jammed and shamed and the gay wins sympathy. Brilliant propaganda — that. The Chinese would be proud.

3) Conversion — The third step is conversion of the public to be receptive to the gay agenda. Conversion requires a change of heart. The change of heart will occur "...if we can actually make them like us," says Kirk and Madsen. "Conversion aims at just this...conversion of the average American's emotions, mind, and will, through a planned psychological attack, in the form of propaganda fed to the media." When the audience begins to sympathize with Tom Hanks in Philadelphia, the process of conversion has begun.

On television, gay comedienne Ellen DeGeneres once used abrasiveness in comedy. Since her public disclosure that she is a lesbian, she has emphasized personal likability. Queer Eye for the Straight Guy emphasizes a goofy cuteness and sweetness. Public likability has eluded the hard-boiled Ellen, but the "fab five" of Queer Eye have been fantastically successful in winning the sentimental favor of the public. No line is too sappy and no situation too mushy for the fab five. Don't you just want to hug them? Folks, this is conversion. Serious conversion. Never underestimate the gushy sentimentality of the American public. The cuteness of Topsy in Uncle Tom's Cabin did more to turn public sentiment away from slavery than all the abolitionists combined.

The big lie

The big lie technique has been used by almost all totalitarians. As explained by Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi propaganda chief, "Tell a lie, make it a big one, repeat it often enough, and a lot of people will believe it." The Chinese propaganda techniques used for the gay agenda are more sophisticated than the bombastic Nazi methods. But as true totalitarians seeking mind control, the people behind the gay agenda are promoting three big lies:1) Homosexuality is genetically determined, 2) Change is not possible, and 3) Gay rights are part of the civil rights agenda. Homosexuality is placed on a par with race and gender. According to the gay agenda, these truths are obvious. No debate is needed. Opposition to these points signifies bigotry.

1) Genetic determinism — Genes determine human choices and the trajectory of human development, we are told. This means that the gay is a programmed automaton and has no choice but to perform those sexual acts which the genes dictate. A full menu of sexual perversions are written into the genes and require only the right opportunity and stimulation to express themselves. This is nonsense, of course. Gays have free will and choice, as do every human being. Sexual perversions must be learned through some combination of experimentation and instruction.

At present, there seems to be no scientific evidence linking particular genes to particular sexual practices. But there is scientific evidence to the contrary. A sample of 90,000 identical twins (who have the same genes) shows no meaningful correlation of the sexual preference for twins raised apart. Fraternal twins had a higher correlation. If genetic determinism was true, there should be 100% correlation. (Source: Bearman & Bruckner, American Journal of Sociology, Vol 107, No 5, 2002)

The Journal of Homosexuality, a gay publication, reports that certain gay-gene studies and gay-brain studies do not stand up to critical analysis. Many gays want the truth instead of the big lie. Others prefer the big lie. The author of one of the criticized gay-gene studies is under investigation for science fraud by the National Institutes of Health for Science Fraud.

2) Gays can't change

Dr. Socarides says that one-third of his former gay patients are now married and most have children. This corresponds with the success rate of the Betty Ford clinic. Another third of Socarides patients remain homosexual, but are not part of the gay scene. They report more control over their impulses and a more responsible approach to sex. The point is that two-thirds of his patients made positive changes to some extent. This excludes the blanket assertion that gays can't change.

3) Discrimination against gays is a civil rights issue

Race and gender are permanent innate characteristics that are fixed at birth. No moral judgment can be made of race and gender, because no one chooses their race or gender.

By contrast, gay sexual activity is a behavior — and a homosexual orientation seems to emerge in developmental stages. Individual choices and social environment profoundly influence the trajectory of development. Sexual perversions must be learned through experimentation and instruction. Such practices are subject to moral judgments.

In view of these facts and controversies, what we need today in America is a moral citizenry immune to such brainwashing and disinformation. If we are to preserve civilization in the face of the relentless lies and deceptive techniques of the gay agenda, enough God-fearing Americans must be willing to stand up for what is right, courageously, and make a difference in the culture war.

A message from Stephen Stone, President, RenewAmerica

I first became acquainted with Fred Hutchison in December 2003, when he contacted me about an article he was interested in writing for RenewAmerica about Alan Keyes. From that auspicious moment until God took him a little more than six years later, we published over 200 of Fred's incomparable essays — usually on some vital aspect of the modern "culture war," written with wit and disarming logic from Fred's brilliant perspective of history, philosophy, science, and scripture.

It was obvious to me from the beginning that Fred was in a class by himself among American conservative writers, and I was honored to feature his insights at RA.

I greatly miss Fred, who died of a brain tumor on August 10, 2010. What a gentle — yet profoundly powerful — voice of reason and godly truth! I'm delighted to see his remarkable essays on the history of conservatism brought together in a masterfully-edited volume by Julie Klusty. Restoring History is a wonderful tribute to a truly great man.

The views expressed by RenewAmerica analysts generally reflect the VALUES AND PHILOSOPHY of RenewAmerica — although each writer is responsible for the accuracy of individual pieces, and the position taken is the writer’s own.